An Unexpected Visitor
by perichat
Summary: Emily falls in love with the missing Overwatch pilot who keeps randomly showing up in her flat.


There's a whole bunch of sad/angsty things about Lena's chronal disassociation and Emily being heartbroken about losing her girlfriend. I didn't want to be sad so I decided to try a lighter, happier, more comedic take on it!

I didn't want to implant to many head canons onto Emily, because (hopefully) we'll learn more about her and I don't want this fic to contradict canon more than this fic already does. But I also didn't want her to have a cardboard personality. Hopefully I succeeded in making her well-rounded and cool as a cucumber.

I'm American so sorry if my British lingo is off.

* * *

Emily stares down at her medical textbook with heavy eyes. The paragraphs blur together nonsensically, and the words have no meaning. She ought to call it a night, but she's in that weird paradoxical state where she's exhausted but still doesn't feel like sleeping. She hears some birds calling off in the distance and looks up to see the sunlight starting to stream in from behind the blinds. It's almost morning.

There's still a little bit of hot water left in the kettle on her stove. Enough for one small cup of tea. Just what she needs to calm her jittery nerves. As she's straining her tea she hears an ear-splitting wail echo from a few feet away. It startles her so much that she screams in response and drops her mug on the cold linoleum floor.

At her kitchen table sits a woman she's never met before. She's blue and translucent, and emits a faint, white glow. She wears a thick, heavy jacket and a round helmet with a transparent visor that covers her eyes. She looks like a racecar driver, or a fighter pilot. Emily locks eyes with the stranger. Her eyes are enormous, and her breathing is heavy. She looks just as terrified as Emily feels.

Then as quickly as she came, she's gone. She flickers away into thin air, like she was on a telly screen that someone suddenly turned off. Emily is left staring dumbfounded at her kitchen table, and her slippers soaked with hot, half-steeped tea.

* * *

Sleep deprivation, text anxiety, too much coffee. There's a myriad of reasons of why she hallucinated a wailing ghost woman sitting at her kitchen table. Maybe her paranoid upstairs neighbors were onto something when they said the building was haunted. Or maybe she's just going mad. She decides that it was just the product of her overactive imagination. Ghosts aren't real. Right?

Then she appears again, three days later.

"Mmm.. that looks good." She hears a high-pitched, cockney accent say from behind her. Emily gasps, and nearly falls out of her chair.

"Sorry! I didn't mean to frighten you luv. Just admiring your dinner."

"Err… It's nothing fancy. Just cold pizza and tea." Emily says hesitantly.

"Still it looks delicious. Then again everything looks delicious to me. Considering I haven't eaten anything in a while." Before Emily can respond she disappears again. Emily rubs her eyes and stares at the spot where she once stood.

"I must be losing my mind." She mutters to herself.

"Nope. I promise I'm very real, and you're perfectly sane." The ghost says again. Emily frantically scans the kitchen to spot her new location.

"Yoo hoo! Up here." She calls, and Emily looks up to see her sitting on top of her fridge. "Sorry I've been bouncing around like that a lot lately. Dunno why, but I can't seem to control it."

"Who are you? What are you?" Emily asks, furrowing her eyebrows.

The woman laughs. "Well if I'm going to barge into your apartment unannounced the least I can do is introduce myself." She blinks off the fridge and appears right in front of her sitting cross-legged on the table.

"I'm Lena Oxton, call sign: Tracer. Nice to meet you." She smiles brightly and holds out her hand to shake.

"I'm Emily. Uh… nice to meet you too." She says and tentatively reaches out to grab it, but it passes right through her.

"Oops that's right, I can't touch anything." Lena says sheepishly. She flickers away and appears a moment later sitting inside her kitchen sink. Her face and name seem familiar. Emily's almost certain she's seen her before. Not someone she's met, but somebody famous. Someone she's seen on the news. Recently.

"Hey, you're that Overwatch pilot that disappeared mid test flight, aren't you?" Emily asks.

Lena nods before blinking away to appear lying down face down on her kitchen floor. "Yup that's me."

"What happened to you? Are you a ghost?"

"I don't know. Everything was going fine with my test flight, then all sorts of emergency lights were flashing and I'd lost control of the plane. I was losing altitude and the cockpit was shaking, then everything went black. When I came to again I was sitting at your kitchen table."

Emily stares at her dumbfounded. She's not sure what to make of her story. Lena blinks off the floor and into the chair next to her. "I don't remember dying. I think I just passed out from too much g-force. You would remember if you died, right?" She looks at her expectantly, as though she had an answer.

"Uh… I don't know. I've never died before."

"You're funny. I like you Emily." She chuckles, and then blinks away into the other chair. "Well at any rate, if I'm not dead I can't be a ghost. I don't know what that makes me though. I really should get hold of Winston. If anyone can figure this out it's him."

Emily starts to ask who Winston is, but Lena blinks away before she can finish. She searches the room to see if stuck in some corner she can't see. Then she checks the other rooms, but there's no sign of her anywhere. Once again, she's vanished into thin air.

Instead of studying Emily browses the internet for information about Lena Oxton. She constantly looks over her shoulder, afraid that Lena will pop in and catch her being a creepy stalker. She remembers bits of her story from all the news reports, but she needs a quick refresher.

Lena was one of Overwatch's most accomplished pilots, and one of their youngest. Emily thought she was older than her, but they're actually just about the same age. There's a few pictures of her making goofy poses for the camera grinning happily alongside her teammates. Her brunette hair seems to be permanently messy, and her eyes are shiny and brown. Emily spends more time than she'd like to admit admiring the light dusting of freckles dotted across her cheeks.

* * *

Lena soon becomes a regular fixture in her flat. Every few days she'll just pop in unannounced, make small talk as she blinks around, and leave as quickly as she arrived. Emily's learned to stop jumping in fright every time she sees a glowing pilot woman lounging around her front room.

As she shows up more often it becomes less of an inconvenience and more of a thing she looks forward to. Lena always knows how to get her to laugh with her goofy antics and corny jokes that would make her father proud. Lena can talk her ear off, and sometimes it can be hard to get a word in edgewise. Emily keeps meaning to ask her about her scientist friend Winston, but Lena always blinks away right as the question is on her tongue.

"Hello! Earth to Emily." Ollie, her study partner, waves his arm in front of her face from across the couch in her front room.

"Sorry, just spaced there for a minute, what's up?" She bites her lip. She'd been thinking about what magazine article to leave out for Lena for tomorrow, just in case she shows up when she's at school.

"Which bone is this again?" Ollie asks. He points at the hand bone diagram on the homework packet they need to complete for anatomy class.

"That's the scaphoid." She answers quickly. She's less concerned about the skeletal system and more concerned about whether or not Lena would care about a new kind of beetle recently discovered in the Amazon rainforest.

Ollie grins at her. "Thanks. I'd be lost without you, you know that?"

"Oh I'm sure you'll get your carpals straight eventually." She chuckles nervously.

Ollie stares at her with this dreamy, longing expression that makes the hairs on her arm stand up. Emily hates when he acts like this. He scoots closer to her. She moves away, backing herself into the corner of her couch.

"So Emily I was wondering, would you like to go out with me sometime?"

"No, sorry I don't think so." She curls her toes and angles her body away from as he again moves closer. "You're very kind, but I'm gay Ollie."

Emily sees the shock register on his face. He jumps back to the other end of the couch, as though he's suddenly realized he's allergic to her. "Oh I'm so sorry! I didn't know that you're uh... I mean, you don't look like you would be uh... well you know." He trails off.

"What does a lesbian look like?" She asks, frowning.

"Fair point." He laughs nervously and licks his lips. His eyes dart away from her and into her kitchen. He squints at something in the distance, like he's trying to read a label on one of her soup cans or something. "I didn't know you had a flatmate. Has she been in there the whole time?"

Emily raises an eyebrow and eyes him strangely. "I don't have a flatmate."

"Really? Then who's that in your kitchen?"

Curiosity heightened, she looks through the doorway and sees Lena standing next to one of her counters, looking out her kitchen window. Her face breaks out into a grin, caused partly because it's Lena, and partly because someone else can see Lena. In an amazing plot twist Emily hasn't just been imagining this cute missing Overwatch pilot in her flat. She covers her smile with her hand in an attempt to look less giddy when she sees Ollie's confused expression.

"Oh! That's Lena! She's just uh… visiting for a little bit." Emily starts to straighten up her papers on the coffee table. "Listen Ollie, I think we've gotten enough done tonight. How about we pick this up again later?"

"Sure, yeah sounds good." He says, and shoves his books hastily into his backpack. "Uh… I'll see you later." For a moment it looks like he's going to hug her, but then he changes his mind and gives her a tiny nod before trailing off through her front door.

Lena blinks into the living room. She sits upside down in her recliner, her feet dangling in the air. "Sorry, I was trying not to interrupt you guys. You didn't have to make him leave on my account."

"No it's fine. We were just about done anyway. Besides, I'm not sure how I would explain your uh… condition to him."

"Just tell him that I'm a ghost of lesbians past who shows up to haunt straight boys who ask gay girls out."

"So you heard that huh?" Emily sighs, blowing her bangs up off her forehead. "I had a feeling he was into me, but I had hoped I was misreading the signals."

"He'll get over it. 'Sides, you're too good for him anyway."

Emily laughs. "You barely know him. Or me for that matter."

"I know enough to know you're too good for him." She says matter-of-factly. She blinks off the recliner and onto the couch, just a few inches away from her. Lena puts a hand on her shoulder, or tries to, it phases right through her. "He does have good taste in women though."

"Oh I… uh… thank you." Emily lets out a flustered giggle and she can feel her ears turning red. Lena has this effect on her where she'll say something clever and she turns into a pile of mush incapable of speaking complete sentences.

Emily takes a breath and gathers her wits. "Before I forget or you blink away, I wanted to ask you something. You mentioned you had a scientist friend, Winston."

"Yeah, what about him?"

"Does he have a phone number? I can try giving him a ring."

* * *

Emily calls up Winston that night. She'd hoped Lena would stick around to give her some credibility, but she blinks away just as she's dialing the numbers. Despite her absence though Winston believes her and sounds absolutely thrilled at her reappearance. He keeps saying over and over again how grateful he is that Emily called him. Everyone at Overwatch has been worried sick. None of their rescue efforts had turned up anything, and they all assumed the worst.

But Winston doesn't have any answers to her ghost-like appearance and inability to stay in one place for more than a few seconds. At least none yet. He says he's going to start investigating right away. They make arrangements for him to make a house visit, and a few days later she's buzzing Winston up to her flat.

Lena's sung nothing but praises for Winston. She calls him incredible and brilliant on a regular basis. Says he's a talented and accomplished scientist, and one of the best friends she has. She failed to mention though that he's a talking, bespeckled gorilla.

"Hello." He says with the same deep, American accent he had on the phone. "I take it you're Emily?"

She's too stunned to say anything so she just nods and steps out of the doorway so he can enter her front room. Winston takes a seat in her recliner, and Emily says a silent prayer that it can hold his weight. She really likes that chair.

"Lena's not in at the moment." Emily says. She sits down on the sofa. "She was here yesterday morning though. She says hello."

Winston smiles. "If I miss her today tell her I said hello as well. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions in her absence?"

"Sure. Ask me anything."

Winston takes out a tablet from his carrying case and places it on her coffee table. "Athena, begin recording." He says, and the tablet makes a beep. Emily watches as the timer starts counting up.

"How often does Lena appear in your apartment?" Winston asks.

"A few times a week. It's starting to get more frequent though. Almost once a day now."

"Is there any pattern to her appearances? Does she show up around the same time each day, or the same day each week?"

Emily shakes her head. "Nothing that I can pick up on anyway. It seems all random."

"Do you know if she visits anywhere else besides this apartment?"

"Yeah, she mentioned once that she frequents this little farm in the countryside."

"Is the farm she visits is located in the present day?"

Emily furrows her eyebrows. "I'm not sure what you mean."

"Let's put it like this; would I be able to visit the farm right now, or would I need a time machine to get there?"

"I don't know. I never thought to ask her anything like that. Do you think she's time-hopping when she blinks about? Is that even possible?"

"I'm not sure. Right now it's just a theory I'm entertaining." Winston pushes his glasses to the brim of his nose. Emily wonders how he can sound so calm and collected about theoretical science that violates the only laws of physics Emily knows.

"Do you know if Lena has any connection to this apartment, or this building? Did she ever live here for instance, or know someone who did."

"Not that I know of. I mean she's from London, but she lived in a completely different borough."

"Actually I think my Uncle Harold lives a few blocks away from here." Lena materializes right behind Winston. He turns around in shock. "But we were never particularly close. He was kind of a snob."

"Tracer, it's good to see you." Winston stares wide-eyed at Lena. On his face is visible relief, but also curiosity and wonderment. Emily can practically see the gears turning in his head. He's a scientist through and through.

"Great to see you too luv!" She smiles exuberantly and moves to hug him, only her arms phase through his body. Then she blinks away and appears again standing behind her telly. "I hope you can tell me what's going on here. Because Emily and I don't have a clue."

* * *

After his initial visit Winston installs a device he calls a chronal activity monitor in her flat. It's a silver box the size of a space heater with a glowing, blue core. It makes booping noises whenever Lena's around. It makes noises when she isn't around too. Emily's not sure why, but it's a delicate piece of machinery and she's too scared to mess with it and find out.

"We could find alternate housing for you, if you don't want to live with all of this experimenting going on." Winston offered when he installed the device in her flat.

Emily answered him immediately and without hesitation. "Nah, it's fine. I like the company."

Winston stops in once a week to check some measurements and numbers and make adjustments to the settings if necessary. Emily leaves him a tray of peanut butter sandwiches cut into triangles and the crusts removed. It's always empty when he leaves.

Lena appears more often and her visits last longer. Sometimes she shows up twice a day and stays for an hour. Her bouncing around becomes less frantic. She can actually stay in one place for more than 15 seconds. Though, even without the chronal disassociation, Lena is a ball of energy who has trouble sitting still.

There's still no pattern to when she shows up. Or where. Once she blinked onto the balcony and was stuck there for nearly 10 minutes before Emily noticed her. After that Emily considered leaving the sliding door permanently open, but she was worried birds might fly into her flat.

With Lena's lengthened presence they're able to have real conversations. Not just quips and banter cut off by Lena disappearing to who knows where. Lena tells incredible stories about her adventures in Overwatch. Emily's amazed and awestruck at the things she's done and the people she associated with. She's on first name terms with Dr. Angela-frickin-Ziegler, who is revered as a god in her field and her personal role model. But to Lena she's just Mercy and one time they went skiing together in the Alps with other noteworthy Overwatch agents.

Emily talks about her life, but it's far less interesting in comparison. Her classes, and her friends and family. Sometimes Lena helps her study. She doesn't know much about medicine and anatomy, but she makes up for it with her enthusiasm and a desire to learn.

"What's a tiny pit or depression in a bone called?" Lena asks.

"Uh…." Emily bites her lip in concentration.

"C'mon luv, you got this!"

"Oh! A fovea!"

"Yeah! That's it!" Lena beams at her and tries to clap her hands, though since she can't touch anything it doesn't make a sound.

"That's it for this practice quiz. You did great, only three wrong! Do you want to start the next one or take a break?"

Emily's stomach gurgles in response. Lena laughs and blinks into the kitchen. Emily sees her sitting on the countertop. She gets off the couch and follows her in.

"I can wait until you're gone to eat. I don't want to tempt you or anything." Emily says. She always feels a little guilty having food around Lena.

Lena smiles. "Nah it's cool. You're not suffering from chronal disassociation. You need to eat or you'll starve. What's for dinner?"

"Not sure, something quick. Maybe a late breakfast? Eggs and toast. Bacon too if I have any. "

"Mmm… I used to love breakfast foods. There's this restaurant in Numbani called Watson & Shirley. Best fry-up I've had in my life."

"A traditional English breakfast in Africa?" Emily quirks an eyebrow at her as she places a slice of bread in the toaster.

"Well Numbani's a whole mish mosh of human and omnic cultures, and all of it's really tasty. My friend Reinhardt says Numbani's Currywurst puts Germany's to shame. And there's this bakery that makes a cherry pie that Commander Morrison swears tastes just like his mum's. Man, I need to stop talking about food it's making me hungry."

Emily stares at Lena, eyes wide and bewildered. She holds the egg she was about to crack in midair.

"Wha?" Lena cocks her head to the side. Her big eyes make her look like a cute, confused puppy.

"You just name-dropped two of the founding members of Overwatch in a sentence like it was no big deal."

Lena shrugs. "Well it's not a big deal. They're just people."

"Yeah, really important people. I don't know why you like to hear about my life, it's so dull compared to yours."

"Different sure, but not dull. I love listening to you talk about your life."

"Why?"

"Because you're so passionate about it. I can tell that you really love what you do. Plus, I never got to have a typical college experience. I joined the Royal Air Force straight out of secondary school, and then Overwatch right after. Sometimes I wonder what it would've been like if I took my life in a different direction."

Before Emily can respond the toaster pings, and a piece of hot, coffee brown toast emerges from the top opening. Emily takes it out, looks at it, then looks at Lena. "You want a taste? I could try feeding it to you?"

"Sure." Lena leans forward to take a bite, but when the toast is just inches from her mouth she blinks away.

Emily looks around the kitchen, trying to spot her. "Lena? Are you still here?"

"I'm in your bedroom." She hears Lena shout from a short distance away. Emily follows the sound of her voice, and sees Lena lying on her stomach in her bed. Her hands prop up her head and she kicks her legs back and forth in the air.

"Hope you don't mind some crumbs in your sheets." Lena says. When Emily gets to the foot of the bed Lena blinks into her desk chair, then barely a second later she's back on her bed. She bounces between her bed and desk a few times before she settles inside her closet.

"You okay there?" Emily asks.

"Yeah I'm alright. Except I seem to be stuck in your closet." She giggles. "Man, I haven't had this problem since grade 9."

Emily rolls her eyes. "Lena, I can't feed you if you keep blinking away."

"Sorry luv, you know I can't control it."

"Sometimes I wonder if that's true or if you're messing with me. Emily swings open the closet doors, but Lena's already disappeared and she's staring at a wall of sweaters and dresses.

"Where are you now Lena?" Emily yells.

"In the front room. Catch me if you can!"

"I swear if you blink away again I am moving to a new flat." Emily stomps out of her bedroom and sees Lena standing in a corner by the front door. Lena sticks out her tongue at her.

"Stay put." She orders. Lena gives her a tiny salute, and stands still as a statue until Emily's within arm's reach. Lena opens her mouth wide and Emily places the toast between her teeth. Lena bites down.

"Can you taste it?" Emily asks.

Lena's quiet for a moment. "Almost."

"Sorry."

She smiles. "It's not your fault. I really appreciate you trying though."

* * *

When Emily falls in love, she sings.

She's not particularly talented at it. There's a reason why her high school choir director always placed her in the back. Usually when there's a song in her head she keeps it there. But thinking about Lena lowers her guard. She feels bright and confident and the music inside her finds ways of escape.

She whistles as she's walking down the street or riding the tube to school. She hums as she studies until Ollie and the rest of her study group kindly tell her to knock it off. She sings in the shower, and she doesn't care if the neighbors who always complain about noise can hear her through the thin walls of her flat.

Emily rinses out the conditioner from her hair, belting out a power rock ballad that's been on her mind all day. She's loud enough that she almost doesn't hear the tiny, high-pitched yelp from behind her. She immediately stops singing, and turns to see what caused the noise. Her body relaxes when she realizes it's Lena. It dawns on her that she's more embarrassed she got caught rocking out in the shower than just being in the shower.

"Oh my god I'm so sorry. I swear I'm not here on purpose." Lena covers her mouth with her hands and her cheeks are deep blue.

"You know, usually I don't let a girl get in the shower with me until after she takes me out to dinner, but I guess in your case I can make an exception." She jests, surprised at her boldness. Lena's face turns even darker blue.

"I'm going to go. Err… you have a lovely voice by the way." Lena says, and walks through the frosted glass shower door as though it's not there. Emily stands under the hot water, feeling oddly pleased at herself.

* * *

Timing is an ever-present thorn in their side. Lena has no control of when she shows up. Sometimes Emily's home, sometimes she's in class. Sometimes it's the middle of the night, and Emily will have bags under her eyes the next day from staying up to talk to Lena. Sometimes she's on the way out the door, and she can't stop to talk no matter how much she wants to.

"Lena! Sorry can't chat. I'm already running behind. Want me to leave the telly on so you have something to do while I'm out?" Emily says.

"Nah, I don't want you to ring up your cable bill on my behalf."

"It's alright, I pay the same regardless of how much I watch. May as well get some use out of it." She turns on the telly and flips the channel to the classic movies network. "Oh look it's Inception! My grandpa loves this movie."

"Mine too! He was a huge Leonardo Dicaprio fan back in the day. So, where are you off too? Got a hot date?" Lena waggles her eyebrows suggestively.

Emily rolls her eyes. "Hardly. Just getting drinks with a few classmates."

"Y'know you talk an awful lot about your academic life and your social life, but you hardly mention your romantic life."

"That's because there isn't much to say about it. I have a girlfriend, her name is med school." Emily jokes. "She runs me ragged but I love her anyway."

Lena laughs. "Really though, a gorgeous girl like you ought to have more romantic prospects than Ollie."

"Err... not really. I think your molecules were still in-sync with the flow of time the last time I had a date." Emily's pulse quickens, and she feels her ears turning red. She gulps. "What about you though? Were you seeing someone before the accident?"

Lena shakes her head. "Nope. Never had much time to socialize outside of Overwatch, and inside it there weren't a whole lot of dating prospects." Lena blinks off the recliner and lands in a spot just a few feet away from her. "However, there is someone I currently have my eye on."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but she's already in a committed relationship with an academic program. I think it's best not to come between them."

Emily takes a breath and hazards a step closer. "Well maybe it's less of a committed relationship, and more of an open one."

Lena grins a crooked, impish smile. "I like the sound of that."

They're standing toe-to-toe and they stare at each other with looks of pure longing. This is the part where they would both close their eyes and lean their heads until their lips met. Emily wants desperately to know what Lena feels like. Tastes like. But their mouths can never meet, and in a few seconds Lena will probably blink away into her bathroom or Victorian England or somewhere else.

Lena strokes a hand on her cheek. Emily watches her. She can see the movement, but she can't feel it. She wants to cry about how unfair it is to want something so badly and be powerless in achieving it. All she can do now is stare and pray that Winston figures out how to cure Lena soon.

The moment is ruined when Emily feels a tickle in her nose. A few seconds later she turns her head away to sneeze into the crook of her elbow.

"Gesundheit." Lena laughs. "Hope you're not coming down with something."

* * *

Two days later Emily wakes up feeling feverish, congested, and miserable. It takes all of her energy and willpower just to shut off her alarm and get out of bed. She gets ready to go with a blanket around her shoulders, but she still can't keep from shivering. All she wants to do is curl up into a tiny ball and sleep for 800 years, but she has class in a half hour.

Lena shows up just as she's packing her book bag. She stares down at her with her hands on her hips and a terse look on her face. "You okay there luv? You're looking a little pale."

"I'm fine." She says, right before sneezing loudly.

"You're not fine you're sick as a dog. Go back to bed."

Emily shakes her head and sniffles. "I can't. I have to get to class."

"Emily I'm not taking no for an answer. You're staying home today."

"But-"

"No buts! Don't worry, I'll take care of everything. I'll use the hands-free on your laptop to email your professors and tell Ollie to get a copy of the homework for you. Now go put on your pyjamas and lie down."

Emily nods. She's too exhausted to fight her, and she knows she's right. She takes off her boots and chucks them at the welcome mat. Then she crawls back under the covers without bothering to undress further. She can hear Lena dictating orders into her computer as she falls back asleep. A tiny smile spreads across her face. She can't remember the last time someone took care of her like this.

It takes Emily three miserable days to get over her bout of the flu. Lena's been mysteriously absent most of whole time, but Emily doesn't lose any sleep over it. In fact that's probably why she never saw her. She's been sleeping almost 12 hours a day. But she knows that someone's been in her flat because a hot bowl of chicken soup gets delivered to her doorstep every afternoon. Emily's all better now, but she's still getting the soup.

Days pass, the soup stops coming, and Lena is still MIA. Emily's nail-biting habit returns as she wonders where she could possibly be. Emily tries to stay optimistic. Lena will be back soon. But she can't shake the feeling in her gut that something's happened to her. Every time she hears a noise in her apartment her heart races in hope that it's Lena, but it never is and she's always left feeling let down. If she lost Lena she's not sure what she'd do with herself.

Emily's fingernails are stubs when she finally decides to give Winston a call. He's smart, maybe he has a reasonable, scientific explanation. But she finds he's as baffled as she is by Lena's sudden disappearance. He does his best to reassure her that she'll come back, but Emily can tell by his shaky voice that he isn't entirely sure.

Winston's been working a couple of gizmos and gadgets to fix Lena's condition. He says a few of them seem promising. He talks about some kind of anti-chronal chamber he built that should keep Lena from bouncing out of it once she's inside. In theory at least. He has nothing to test it out on. And it's all the way in Gibraltar so he's not even sure how he'd get her there.

But he does have a plan when she returns. If she returns.

* * *

It's nearly a week later when Lena finally reappears.

Emily's in her front room studying, in such deep concentration she almost misses the glowing figure on the balcony. When she sees Lena sitting on the wrought iron railing her mood instantly brightens. A warmth radiates in her chest and her face breaks out into a grin. She rushes over to her, ready to envelop her in a hug despite the fact that they can't make any physical contact.

"Lena! I've missed you so much! I'm finally over my flu by the way. Thanks again for the soup."

Lena shrugs. "I didn't really do anything. Just placed a recurring delivery order."

"Lena are you okay?" Emily stares at her. She's got worry lines on her forehead and her arms clutch her chest tightly.

"Yeah. I'm fine." She says with a blank, far-off look on her face.

"Lena, what's wrong?" She asks again. "C'mon talk to me. What happened? Where have you been?"

Lena takes a breath. "I blinked back to a battle during the omnic crisis. God, I felt like I was trapped there for weeks. All around me people were dying, and I couldn't do anything but watch by helplessly."

"Oh Lena, I'm so sorry. That sounds horrible."

"I can't keep living like this Emily." Tears well up in her eyes. Emily's never seen her so down before. Lena's always been so positive, it seemed like nothing could shatter her optimism. But everyone has a breaking point. Emily can feel her heart shattering into pieces. She wants to hold Lena. She wants to kiss her pain away. But she can't. She can't even truthfully tell her everything will be alright.

"Lena, Winston's hard at work on a cure. I just talked to him. He's got a few things he's working on. He'll have you better soon. And if he can't do it I'll drop out of med school, become a chronal physicist, and bring you back myself. I promise I'll do everything in my power to make you better."

Lena wipes a tear away from her eye. "You've already done so much. Just talking to you helps. It gets so lonely drifting aimlessly through time. I always hope I end up here."

"And I always look forward to when you show up. I was going crazy waiting for you to come back. I care about you a lot Lena." She tries to take Lena by the hand, but it just phases right through her.

"And I care about you a lot too." Lena says, right before she vanishes away, and Emily is left alone.

* * *

Winston doubles down on his efforts to find a cure for Lena. They don't want to lose her again, and it's become clearer than ever that it's unhealthy for her to stay in this condition. Emily wonders if she can send peanut butter sandwiches by mail or if they will go stale by the time they reach Gibraltar.

At four in the morning on a rainy Tuesday Emily is awoken by an urgent call from Winston. He's finally got a transport device ready to take Lena to Gibraltar. He's taking the fastest jet in Overwatch's fleet to get to London, and he'll be at her apartment in 2 hours.

Once Winston arrives all they can do is wait. Emily paces the floor of her apartment in silence. She skips class so she can say goodbye. Minutes and hours pass without any sign of her. Finally Lena shows up in the front room just as the sun is starting to set, cheerful and bubbly as ever.

"Hey Emily! And Winston? What are you doing here?" She asks, cocking her head to the side.

"I'm here to take you to Gibraltar to run some experiments."

"Great! How are you gonna get me there? Don't get me wrong I'd love to go, but I can't exactly stay in one place for very long."

"I've built something." Winston says. He motions to the silver, eerily coffin-like contraption he brought with him. "This is a miniature of the version I have in Gibraltar. I promise the actual one is much roomier. As long as you're inside it you can't escape."

"Well then it's a good thing I'm not claustrophobic." Lena says. Winston opens the door to his contraption and Lena steps inside.

"Can you hear me?" Emily shouts once the door is shut.

"Yeah." Lena shouts back in return.

"I'm gonna miss you."

"Me too! I'll come back and visit as soon as I'm better."

Emily knows this is what's best for her. This is the only way she's going to get cured. But she still feels a pain in her gut watching Winston take her out of her flat. She hasn't even left yet and she already misses her.

"I'll be waiting."

* * *

"Hi Winston. It's Emily. Sorry to bother you, I was just wondering what the progress is on Lena? It's been three weeks and I haven't heard anything, so I figured I'd give you a call. Anyway that's it. Uh… cheers!" Emily hangs up the phone and sighs. Leaving a message on the phone always makes her feel stupid and awkward.

She's hoped Lena would keep her up to date on what's going. Let her know what progress they've made. Or even just call to say hello, I miss you. But the last she heard from anyone was when Winston came to collect her.

Maybe she's not as important to Lena as she thought.

A half hour later she feels her phone buzz in her pocket. When she sees it's Winston she scurries out of her lecture hall as fast as she can to answer it.

"Hello Emily."

"Winston! Hi!" She grins.

"Sorry I missed your call. I was in the middle of running a test."

"That's alright. Err… how are things?"

"Things are good. I've actually been meaning to update you on our progress. There's something I'm working on. It's still in the early stages of development, but it's very promising. I call it a chronal accelerator."

"That's great Winston. How long do you think it'll take to finish?"

"I'm not sure. A few weeks perhaps? I'm sorry Emily, I wish I could give you a better answer."

"That's alright, I was just wondering. I hadn't heard anything from anyone."

"Sorry I haven't kept in better contact with you."

"Oh no it's okay. I'm sure you're quite busy." Emily says quickly. Winston's done so much to help Lena, she certainly doesn't want to make him feel bad.

"You know, Tracer talks about you all the time." Winston says.

"Really?" Emily grins and feels her ears turning red.

"Yes, she's quite taken by you. She tells anyone who'll listen how after she's fixed she's going to take you out for a night on the town. I'd let you speak with her right now, but she's being examined by one of my colleagues at the moment. "

"Can you tell her I called, and that I miss her?"

"Of course, and I'll schedule in some time for you to talk with her. I'm sure she'd like that."

"I'd like that too."

* * *

Emily and Lena talk every day at 4 PM. She's grateful for the finite schedule. It's nice to be able to talk to her at an exact time rather than whenever she pops in. But Emily desperately misses seeing her face.

"Winston ran a test on me this morning with the chronal accelerator." Lena says. She sounds somewhat out of breath. Maybe it's the testing? "Unfortunately it didn't work as expected. He's going back to the drawing board to try something else. Which means I'm going to be stuck here longer."

"Oh no! When I talked to him the other day he seemed so optimistic that it would work. He said you'd probably be able to leave really soon."

"Yeah well you know how science is." She says dismissively. "Things look good on paper but don't work out in practice."

"Here's hoping the next thing works."

"Yeah here's hoping." She says cheerily. "Y'know Winston had Mercy in a few days ago to help him out with some tests. I told her all about you. She said she'd love to meet you some time."

Emily squeaks. "Lena you didn't! You better not be pulling my leg here."

"Swear on my life."

"Oh my god, Lena if you introduce me to Dr. Ziegler I will kiss you."

"I might just have to take you up on that offer." She can practically hear her smirking over the phone. It makes Emily's insides heat up.

Emily hears a rhythmic knock on her door. She groans. It's probably her next-door neighbors, who always complain she's making too much noise when she's on the phone with Lena. It's not her fault the walls in their building are paper thin.

"Hang on a minute Lena, the noise police are knocking."

She rolls of her couch and starts mentally preparing her apologies. But when she opens the door it's not her neighbor ready to scold her. It's a friendly face she's seen dozens of times before. Only now it's opaque and colorful, with rosy cheeks and copper brown eyes.

"Cheers luv, the cavalry's here."

Emily drops her phone. It lands with a loud clatter, but she couldn't care less. An enormous grin spreads across her face, and happy tears well up in her eyes. She's too stunned to speak, all she can do is stare at Lena and her messy, brown hair and toothy smile.

"You alright there?" Lena asks.

"Why did you lie to me? Telling me the experiment didn't work and you'd be there a few more weeks?"

"I wanted to surprise you. Looks like it worked." She chuckles.

"You're a horrible person, you know that?" Emily says, then pulls her in to kiss her hard on the lips. Lena's momentarily stunned, but she catches on quickly, wrapping her arms around Emily's waist and returning the kiss with equal fervor. Emily's dreamed about this moment for weeks and months, but it's so much sweeter in reality. Lena's skin is soft and smooth and her mouth is warm. She pulls her in closer, until there's no space between their bodies and all she can smell is Lena. When they break apart Lena's lips are red and her cheeks are flushed. Emily's never seen anything more lovely.

"What's that?" Emily asks. She points at the glowing blue device strapped to her chest.

Lena grins. "Glad you asked! It's the chronal accelerator I said didn't work. It keeps my body in-sync with the flow of time. And it lets me do cool stuff like this."

Lena zips away from her and into her flat. It's almost like what she used to do, but there's something different about. She leaves behind a streaky blue tail as she blinks from one location to the next. Emily thinks if she slows it down and studies it she could see Lena moving from one place to the next.

Emily pinches the brim of her nose. "Oh god not this again."

Lena stops bouncing around, and lands in a spot just inches away from her. "It's alright. I'm in control of it now. No more randomly jumping away for days."

"Thank God for that. So... uh are you hungry?" She asks.

"Starving."

"I'll take you out to eat. Anything you want. What are you hungry for?"

Lena thinks for a moment. "I could really go for a hot fudge sundae. With whipped cream and hot fudge and lots of sprinkles."

"I know just the place. There's an ice cream parlour up the street that serves massive sundaes that we could split."

"Excuse me, split a sundae?"

Emily laughs and rolls her eyes. "Okay fine, we can each get our own. But I'm not kidding when I say they're massive."

"Well I'm not kidding when I say I'm starving."

Emily grabs her bag and slings it over her shoulder. "Alright, but as a doctor in training I ought to warn you you're going to get a stomachache."

Emily takes Lena's hand, and laces her fingers between hers. They intertwine together perfectly.


End file.
